Fountain of LightMeditationsLeaving the Stream of the KnownMartin LeFevre: It's amazing how the limited, two-dimensional known overtakes the limitless, multi-dimensional unknown. Even after a tremendous meditation, during which one leaves the stream of the known, transcends death and feels intimations of immortality, the known soon returns. ... The problem with framing the ecological crisis in terms of climate change is that while the crisis is unfolding incredibly quickly in evolutionary terms, it seems to be happening in slow motion in human terms. ... The issue goes much deeper than the climate change framework. In fact, climate change has become almost allegorical, a metaphor for man's impact on the Earth and people's capacity to care about the Earth and about future generations. ... Jan 21, 2019, 3:05pm

EditorialsWho Killed Martin Luther King?Do you remember Dick Nixon on tape about the Warren report into JFK's assasination- "That it was the biggest hoax ever perpetuated on the American people"? Well believing James Earl Ray as a lone assassin killed King has got to be the second biggest hoax! (Reprinted every year until justice is done)Jan 21, 2019, 11:54am

EnvironmentBattery boom aids climate change battle Paul Brown:The fastest-expanding industrial sector on the planet is now electricity storage − a battery boom which heralds an end to the need for fossil fuels. ... Recent developments in batteries are set to sweep aside the old arguments about renewables being intermittent, dismissing any need to continue building nuclear power plants and burning fossil fuels to act as a back-up when the wind does not blow, or the sun does not shine. ... Batteries as large as the average family house and controlled by digital technology are being positioned across electricity networks. They are being charged when electricity is in surplus and therefore cheap, and the power they store is resold to the grid at a higher price during peak periods...[ Visit Website ]Jan 21, 2019, 11:27am

CommentaryWe Need a Martin Luther King Day of TruthEdward Curtin:“Nothing in all the world is more dangerous,” warned Dr. King, “than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.” ... Educating people about the fact that U.S. government forces conspired to kill Dr. King, and why, and why it matters today, is the greatest service we can render to his memory. ... William Pepper’s decades-long investigation not only refutes the flimsy case against the alleged assassin James Earl Ray, but definitively proves that King was killed by a government conspiracy led by J. Edgar Hoover, the FBI, Army Intelligence, and the Memphis Police, assisted by southern Mafia figures. ... “He who lives with untruth lives in spiritual slavery,” King told us, “Freedom is still the bonus we receive for knowing the truth.” ...[ Visit Website ]Jan 21, 2019, 10:37am

MeditationsHumanity Is Not EvolvingMartin LeFevre: Humanity is on a downward spiral, and our regression as humans directly proportional to man's decimation of the Earth (and inversely proportional to scientific and technological growth. ... There is a way ahead, though it's more radical than "thought leaders" are willing to consider. The belief in progress is blocking the path to genuine human advancement. ... Time is thought; thought is becoming; and becoming is suffering and sorrow. When thought falls completely silent in attention, there is just the unfolding of what is, and the movement of time, suffering and sorrow ends within one, at least 'temporarily.'...Jan 19, 2019, 5:45pm

Consider This....Women Now Run the Military-Industrial Complex. That’s Nothing To Celebrate.Dean Spade and Sarah Lazare: Major media outlets are fawning over the fact that women are taking over top positions in the country’s largest weapons companies and in U.S. defense and intelligence agencies. ... Feminism ... is increasingly being co-opted to promote and sell the U.S. military-industrial complex: a profoundly violent institution that will never bring liberation to women—whether they are within its own ranks or in the countries bearing the greatest brunt of its brutality. ... “Sure, it's great that you have a woman at the head of Raytheon, but what about the women who those bombs are being dropped on?” ... The impacts of war—such as reduction in basic services, electricity, and access to food and water, loss of family members, and increased rates of illness and disability—all increase women’s vulnerability to assault and worsen the conditions of women’s labor...[ Visit Website ]Jan 19, 2019, 12:32pm

CommentaryRacism Is A Far Too Common Experience For Native PeopleIvan Star Comes Out:Racism has abandoned its murky corners as 2018 comes to an end. ... This unfounded hatred was once done secretly, now it is out in the open. The national government has become an obvious nesting site for this violent bigotry. Also, it is obvious to see that it has infiltrated all levels of local government, including courts, police, jail, and social services. These bigots are of European Caucasoid origin, educated, illiterate, elderly, young, rich and poor. ... A tiny ray of hope for regaining some dignity in this country is that not all white-skinned people are bigots. However, the groundless hatred is consuming morality. ... Modern scholars have now uncovered the hidden historic fact that since 1492, that 80% to 90% of the original inhabitants of North, Central, and South America perished...[ Visit Website ]Jan 19, 2019, 12:12pm

ArticlesSky Bears, Earth Bears: Finding and Losing True North Louisa Willcox: Stars and the heavens have long captured the human imagination. ... ancient peoples invented fascinating stories about constellations that reflected their aspirations and relationships with the natural world and each other. The dramas that played out in the heavens unified their world and gave their lives meaning. ... No group of stars has been more durably famous than the Big Dipper, which is part of the constellation Ursa Major, the Great Bear. ... Ursa Major and its neighbor Ursa Minor, the Lesser or Little Bear, are the first two constellations listed in the earliest star catalogues dating from nearly 3000 years ago. ... Playing center stage in the night sky, bears were often depicted as guides and teachers, and literally provided direction...[ Visit Website ]Jan 19, 2019, 11:55am

EnvironmentRecycling is not enough. Zero-packaging stores show we can kick our plastic addictionSabrina Chakori and Ammar Abdul Aziz: Plastic now litters the planet, contaminating ecosystems and posing a significant threat to wildlife and human health. Food and beverage packaging accounts for almost two-thirds of total packaging waste. Recycling, though important, has proven an incapable primary strategy to cope with the scale of plastic rubbish. In Australia, for example, just 11.8% of the 3.5 million tonnes of plastics consumed in 2016-2017 were recycled. ... The emergence of zero-packaging food stores is challenging the idea that individually packaged items are a necessary feature of the modern food industry. ... Zero-packaging shops, sometimes known as zero-waste grocery stores, allow customers to bring and refill their own containers. They offer food products (cereals, pasta, oils) and even household products (soap, dishwashing powder). You simply bring your own jars and containers and buy as little or as much as you need...[ Visit Website ]Jan 18, 2019, 3:14pm

Did You KnowThe Vice President's MenSeymour M. Hersh When George H.W. Bush arrived in Washington as vice president in January 1981 he seemed little more than a sideshow to Ronald Reagan ... There was another view of Bush: the one held by the military men and civilian professionals who worked for him on national security issues. Unlike the president, he knew what was going on and how to get things done. For them, Reagan was ‘a dimwit’ who didn’t get it, or even try to get it. ... Bush was different: he got it. At his direction, a team of military operatives was set up that bypassed the national security establishment – including the CIA – and wasn’t answerable to congressional oversight. It was led by Vice-Admiral Arthur Moreau, a brilliant navy officer who would be known to those on the inside as ‘M’. ... he oversaw a secret team – operating in part out of the office of Daniel Murphy, Bush’s chief of staff – which quietly conducted at least 35 covert operations against drug trafficking, terrorism and, most important, perceived Soviet expansionism in more than twenty countries...[ Visit Website ]Jan 18, 2019, 3:06pm

CommentarySaving America and the World by Slashing US Military Spending -Shut down the war machine!Dave LIndorff: The time has come to cut the US military down to size. ... By all accounts, the US accounts for more than a third of all global military spending. ... Let’s be honest: The United States faces no significant threat from any nation in the world. ... The reality is that it is the US which is the most threatening and destabilizing force in the world today. ... It is simply madness that has led us to this point. Madness by a ruling elite that only cares about grasping an ever larger share of the national and global wealth ... There is an urgent need for the US, and for the people of this self-described “indispensable” nation to wake up from our torpor, to throw off our fear-induced and greed-driven obsession with military spending, and to turn both inward to the need to develop a humane and sustainable society that benefits all its members, and outward to become a cooperative and non-threatening member of the global community of nations...[ Visit Website ]Jan 18, 2019, 2:32pm

NewsMatamoros, Mexico strike of over 70,000 workers enters sixth day (Amid Media Blackout)Alex González and Andrea Lobo: Over 70,000 “maquiladora” workers from 45 factories in the US-Mexico border town of Matamoros, Mexico have entered the sixth day of their courageous struggle as more and more plants are paralyzed throughout the city. ... The strike could very soon disrupt global supply chains in the United States, Canada and Asia. ... The strike is affecting major suppliers to the "Big Three” automakers—GM, Ford and Fiat-Chrysler—as well as other manufacturers. Factories that are on strike include Autoliv, Inteva, Starkey, Edemsa, Aipsa, Cepillos, STC, Polytech, Kemet, Tyco, Parker and AFX. ... The workers are sharing information through Facebook ... The strike at Matamoros has been completely ignored by the corporate media. There is not a single article about the Matamoros strike in any of the major Mexican or international news outlets...[ Visit Website ]Jan 18, 2019, 2:15pm

BooksLong Live the Armed Struggle!Paul Haeder: Women Politicals in America: Jailed Dissenters from Mother Jones to Lynne Stewart. by Linda G. Ford. ... Jailers who willingly neglect the health of prisoners. Prison medical experts denying basic life saving treatment. Massive censorship of prisoners’ reading and writing. Male nurses ramming fingers up a political’s anus and vagina. Locked in High Security Units in what Silvia Baraldini called “a living tomb . . . a white sepulcher.” She was part of the May 19th Communist group and Black Liberation Army. She was charged with BLA robberies – however, she was in Zimbabwe when one of them took place. ... What happened to Standing Rock water protector Red Fawn Fallis is what has happened to many women political dissenters who go up against Big Government/Corporate power. After she was viciously tackled by several police officers (caught on video), she was brought up on serious charges of harming those who harmed her...Jan 17, 2019, 4:09pm

CommentaryCountering the smears against the Women’s MarchJen Roesch: By all measures, the Women’s Marches — the first of which set the tone for protest during the Trump era with the largest single day of protest in U.S. history — should be looking toward their greatest success yet. ... Instead, the organizers have come under intense attack, and the marches themselves, scheduled for this weekend, are experiencing a crisis. ... In this case, the real threat of anti-Semitism is being cynically exploited to smear the leaders of the Women’s Marches ... the chorus of condemnation has been largely orchestrated by right-wing and Zionist voices, inside and outside the broad left, with the aim of undermining some of the more radical politics of the Women’s March organizers, particularly around the question of Palestine...[ Visit Website ]Jan 17, 2019, 2:59pm

BooksTop 10 Basic Income Articles of 2018 by Scott Santens(8) "The Great Equalizer: What Dolly Parton and a Tennessee Wildfire Can Teach About Universal Basic Income" by Daniela Perdomo for In The Mesh ... In late 2016, a forest fire in Tennessee burned down about 1,000 homes, and in response Dolly Parton came to the rescue of the newly homeless victims with $1,000 per month for five months followed by an additional (and entirely unexpected) $5,000 check in the sixth month for a grand total of $10,000. ... Basically, basic income increased resiliency to disaster by helping everyone get back on their feet faster by providing people with what they needed most - cash to self-determine their own priorities. ... “It was very rare, I can almost get a tear. I just — to talk about it is one thing, but when it happens to you...,” ... the Gatlinburg community has changed: “People are helping people who weren’t helping before. You can’t buy that.” ...[ Visit Website ]Jan 17, 2019, 10:32am